Quincannon stayed where he was, waiting, his eye on the lavatory door. His pipe went out; he relighted it. Two more men — a rough-garbed miner and a gaudily outfitted drummer — came into the smoker. Couplings banged and the car lurched slightly as its wheels passed over a rough section of track. Outside the windows a lake shimmered into view on the southern desert flats, then abruptly vanished: heat mirage.
The door to the lavatory remained closed.
A prickly sensation that had nothing to do with the heat formed between Quincannon’s shoulder blades. How long had Gaunt been in there? Close to ten minutes. He tamped the dottle from his pipe, stowed the briar in the pocket of his cheviot. The flashily dressed drummer left the car; a fat man with muttonchop whiskers like miniature tumbleweeds came in. The fat man paused, glancing around, then turned to the lavatory door and tried the latch. When he found it locked he rapped on the panel. There was no response.
Quincannon was on his feet by then, with the prickly sensation as hot as a fire-rash. He prodded the fat man aside, ignoring the indignant oath this brought him, and laid an ear against the panel. All he could hear were train sounds: the pound of beating trucks on the fishplates, the creak and groan of axle play, and the whisper of the wheels. He banged on the panel with his fist, much harder than the fat man had. Once, twice, three times. This likewise produced no response.
“Hell and damn!” he growled aloud, startling the fat man, who turned quick for the door and almost collided with another just stepping through. The newcomer, fortuitously enough, was Mr. Bridges.
When the conductor saw Quincannon’s scowl, his back stiffened and alarm pinched his sallow features. “What is it?” he demanded. “What’s happened?”
“Even Gaunt went in here some minutes ago and he hasn’t come out.”
“You don’t think he—?”
“Use your master key and we’ll soon find out.”
Bridges unlocked the door. Quincannon pushed in first, his hand on the butt of his Navy Colt — and immediately blistered the air with a five-jointed oath.
The cubicle was empty.
“Gone, by all the saints!” Bridges said behind him. “The damned fool went through the window and jumped.”
The lone window was small, designed for ventilation, but not too small for a man Gaunt’s size to wiggle through. It was shut but not latched; Quincannon hoisted the sash, poked his head out. Hot, dust-laden wind made him pull it back in after a few seconds.
“Gone, yes,” he said, “but I’ll eat my hat if he jumped at the rate of speed we’ve been traveling.”
“But... but he must have. The only other place he could’ve gone—”
“Up atop the car. That’s where he did go.”
Bridges didn’t want to believe it. His thinking was plain: If Gaunt had jumped, he was rid of the threat to his and his passengers’ security. He said, “A climb like that is just as dangerous as jumping.”
“Not for a nimble and desperate man.”
“He couldn’t hide up there. Nor on top of any of the other cars. Do you think he crawled along the roofs and then climbed back down between cars?”
“It’s the likeliest explanation.”
“Why would he do such a thing? There’s nowhere for him to hide inside, either. The only possible places are too easily searched. He must know that, if he’s ridden a train before.”
“We’ll search them anyway,” Quincannon said darkly. “Every nook and cranny from locomotive to caboose, if necessary. Evan Gaunt is still on the Desert Limited, Mr. Bridges, and we’re damned well going to find him.”
The first place they went was out onto the platform between the lounge car and the smoker, where Quincannon climbed the iron ladder attached to the smoker’s rear wall. From its top he could look along the roofs of the cars, protecting his eyes with an upraised arm: the coal-flavored smoke that rolled back from the locomotive’s stack was peppered with hot cinders. As expected, he saw no sign of Gaunt. Except, that was, for marks in the thin layers of grit that coated the tops of both lounge car and smoker.
“There’s no doubt now that he climbed up,” he said when he rejoined Bridges. “The marks on the grit are fresh.”
The conductor’s answering nod was reluctant and pained.
Quincannon used his handkerchief on his sweating face. It came away stained from the dirt and coal smoke, and when he saw the streaks, his mouth stretched in a thin smile. “Another fact: No matter how long Gaunt was above or how far he crawled, he had to be filthy when he came down. Someone may have seen him. And he won’t have wandered far in that condition. Either he’s hiding where he lighted, or he took the time to wash up and change clothes for some reason.”
“I still say it makes no sense. Not a lick of sense.”
“It does to him. And it will to us when we find him.”
They went to the rear of the train and began to work their way forward, Bridges alerting members of the crew and Quincannon asking questions of selected passengers. No one had seen Gaunt. By the time they reached the first-class Pullman, the urgency and frustration both men felt were taking a tolclass="underline" preoccupied, Quincannon nearly bowled over a pudgy, bonneted matron outside the women’s lavatory and Bridges snapped at a white-maned, senatorial gent who objected to having his drawing room searched. It took them ten minutes to comb the compartments there and the berths in the second-class Pullman: another exercise in futility.
In the first of the day coaches, Quincannon beckoned Sabina to join them and quickly explained what had happened. She took the news stoically; unlike him, she met any crisis with a shield of calm. She said only, “He may be full of tricks, but he can’t make himself invisible. Hiding is one thing; getting off this train is another. We’ll find him.”
“He won’t be in the other two coaches. That leaves the baggage car, the tender, and the locomotive; he has to be in one of them.”
“Shall I go with you and Mr. Bridges?”
“I’ve another idea. Do you have your derringer with you or packed away in your grip?”
“In here.” She patted her reticule.
“Backtrack on us, then; we may have somehow overlooked him. But don’t take a moment’s chance if he turns up.”
“I won’t,” she said. “And I’ll warn you the same.”
The baggage master’s office was empty. Beyond, the door to the baggage car stood open a few inches.
Scowling, Bridges stepped up to the door. “Dan?” he called. “You in there?”
No answer.
Quincannon drew his revolver, shouldered Bridges aside, and widened the opening. The oil lamps were lighted; most of the interior was visible. Boxes, crates, stacks of luggage, and express parcels — but no sign of human habitation.
“What do you see, Mr. Quincannon?”
“Nothing. No one.”
“Oh, Lordy, I don’t like this, none of this. Where’s Dan? He’s almost always here, and he never leaves the door open or unlocked when he isn’t. Gaunt? Is he responsible for this? Oh, Lordy, I should’ve listened to you and held the train in Needles.”
Quincannon shut his ears to the conductor’s babbling. He eased his body through the doorway, into an immediate crouch behind a packing crate. Peering out, he saw no evidence of disturbance. Three large crates and a pair of trunks were belted into place along the near wall. Against the far wall stood a wheeled luggage cart piled with carpetbags, grips, and war bags. More luggage rested in neat rows nearby; he recognized one of the larger grips, pale blue and floral-patterned, as Sabina’s. None of it appeared to have been moved except by the natural motion of the train.